


you must really like me

by villannelle



Category: Overwatch (Video Game)
Genre: Doctor x Vampire, F/F, Halloween Mercymaker, Mercymaker day
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-31
Updated: 2020-10-31
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:08:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,498
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27280216
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/villannelle/pseuds/villannelle
Summary: Angela wasn’t a stranger to the speculation going on in the town of a monster residing in the Château Guillard after its owners’ passing. Everyone claimed to know a friend of a friend that had attempted to visit and never came back.She was a woman of science, not one to believe children’s tales about beasts and creatures lurking in the dark.But Amelie’s disappearance, or rather her own inability to get over it, had changed something in her.
Relationships: Widowmaker | Amélie Lacroix/Angela "Mercy" Ziegler
Comments: 2
Kudos: 34





	you must really like me

The loud squeaking of the main door as it opened, the whimper of its rusty hinges that barely managed to keep it from falling off… it sounded so stereotypically creepy it almost felt staged.

Angela’s palms, still sheathed in a pair of woolen gloves, rested flat against the wet, musty wood of the door while the woman categully assessed her surroundings, studying as much of the interior of the building as she possibly could with the little amount of light the moon provided.

She shivered. The snow outside fell heavy and mercilessly, and once the carriage and its driver, who after much hesitation and the promise that she knew what she was doing had agreed to drive Angela so far away from the village started to make their way back to civilization, the only thing keeping the woman company was the loud warning of a blizzard forming outside and inviting her to put her hesitation aside and enter the building once and for all.

And so she did, floorboards creaking with each footstep when Angela finally gathered the courage to walk in and, not without effort, close the massive entrance door behind her. It didn’t completely shield her from the cold, but not having the wind blow its furious rage against her did give the woman enough comfort to take off her gloves, opening and closing her hands to try and regain the feeling in her fingers.

The tall silhouette of a fireplace at the back of the room drew Angela in, who found comfort in focusing on something other than how terrifying the building was when submerged in the darkness of such a lonely night. Staircases rose in both sides of the room, and even though Angela could swear she heard one of the steps squeak, when she stopped dead in her tracks to glance towards the left of the room she found nothing and no one there. She was relieved. And slightly disappointed.

Her eyes lingered on that one step for a moment when she resumed her walk towards the fireplace, turning her attention towards it and crouching when she reached the structure.

A few pieces of wet wood had been carelessly stacked on top of each other next to it. Maybe the person who put them there wasn’t as much at fault for their condition as the pass of time was, but Angela was confident that despite it all she would be able to lit a fire with the tools that she’d been given. 

It took some effort to take off the fireplace’s cover, and Angela was thankful she’d taken her gloves off beforehand when putting the metal guard in front of it, her hands immediately turning black. She chose to believe it was soot and not pure dirt, even though it was likely a disgusting mix of the two. Angela wasn’t one to worry about getting her hands dirty; it was hard to do so when you were the only doctor of an aged, small town. Its locals were not only as old as the village itself, but they required pretty much the same amount of maintenance work.

She was too young for that place; the residents of Annecy repeatedly told her so ever since the first day she set foot in their village for a temporary visit years ago. They wanted to know why she had decided to move in so abruptly, and Angela told everyone the same thing. She’d just… fallen in love with the place.

They still wondered how one could fall in love so quickly with the most impoverished and ruinous side of the region, but Angela dismissed their concerns with a snide remark and a wave of the hand.

It took not one, nor two, nor three attempts, but finally the fourth match the blonde grabbed was dry enough that it managed to light up. She quickly leaned her body forward to protect the wood from the cold and drew the fire close to it, allowing it to spread for a little bit before placing two pieces of coal she’d found scattered on the floor on top of it.

The flames disappeared for a moment before coming back stronger than before, and Angela sighed in relief and self satisfaction. She pulled on the fabric covering her nose and mouth to reveal them and brought her face closer to the fire, closing her eyes for a short moment before standing back up.

Before walking away from the comforting crackling of the fireplace, she grabbed the match she’d recently lit and approached a small table that sat against the side of one of the staircases. She took a small oil lamp off of it and lit it just as she’d done with the fire, only this time it took way less effort; the fuel chamber had already been filled, so once the wick was ignited all that was left was putting her finger through the handle and she had a source of light following her every step.

The glow radiating off of both fires gave the room a much less terrifying appearance, although it didn’t make it any more welcoming than before. Spiderwebs hung from almost every corner of the room, and the ceiling looked like it could collapse on top of her at any given moment. This didn’t deter Angela from approaching one of the staircases and climbing up to the second floor, wiping her free hand on her woollen shawl before pulling on it to take it off of her body and draping it over the handrail.

She glanced up and extended her arm and the oil lamp along with it, trying to discern something, anything, that stood more than a foot in front of her.

Before she could take a fourth step, Angela lost her balance and let out a loud yelp.

The rotten wood of a step had given in under her weight, making her fall forward on one knee and almost drop the lamp. She stared at it as it dangled in front of her face, wide eyed, an image of the whole building lit up in flames appearing in her mind for a moment.

That would have been an awful waste of a year worth of her salary.

Again, Angela could swear she heard something… a like a dry cackle coming from upstairs, and started to wonder if the house itself was making fun of her or if perhaps the few minutes she’d spent by herself in there had been enough to make her go crazy.

The doctor managed to slip her foot out of the hole it had pierced through the wood, grunting in exasperation before continuing to make her way up, this time much more aware of where she put her body’s weight. This time it had only been a step, but judging by the hate the building seemed to harbor for her she may not be as lucky next time.

Once safe from the dangers of the staircase and before heading to the next one at the other side of the landing, Angela paused and stared at the wall next to her.

Or, rather, at the two big portraits that hung there.

Well… big was a bit of an understatement. The pieces of art covered almost entirely the wall from its mid point to the next floor’s landing. The white of the wallpaper that was exposed in the space between the two paintings was much more intense and well kept than the rest of the room, revealing the fact that there used to be a different canvas there that protected that area from the harsh effects of the sun.

Angela had no way of knowing what painting used to hang there, but what she knew is that now two pairs of eyes stared back at her as she tilted her head backwards and brought a hand to her pained neck, feeling small under their attentive scrutiny.

One of them was of a man, chest puffed and a charming smile spread beneath his carefully crafted mustache. Even though he was an attractive man, something evident even to Angela despite her inmense lack of interest for the opposite sex, he didn’t look especially interesting to look at. It was a standard portrait; she’d seen that smile hundreds of times before.

The one next to it on the other hand, sparked conflicting feelings inside her.

Angela extended her arm again and brought the oil lamp closer to the next painting to try to get a better glance at the woman depicted there. She had dark eyes and even darker hair, which had been all garnered on the back of her head in a very skillfully crafted chignon. She sported gold jewelry in almost every visible part of her body; her ears, neck and wrists were tastefully adorned by visibly expensive ornaments.

None of them drew Angela’s attention as intensely as the woman’s glazed expression did.

It wasn’t that she looked bored, at least not only that. Her mind seemed to be somewhere different, far away from that place and time as she posed for the artist illustrating her. In a way, Angela felt the woman was looking down at her in more than one way, as if she were aware of how expensive her purple and green gown was in comparison to the blonde’s humble peach tinted dress. She pulled on its collar, suddenly feeling self conscious about her choice in garments.

You’d think such a derogatory stare would make her feel negatively towards the woman in the painting; why did she assume she was better than Angela? She didn’t even know her!

Instead, the blonde found herself inevitably craving her approval, the lack of interest she showed in her only drawing her further into those lifeless eyes.

She was one of _those_ people. So visibly proud and dignified, yet somehow so enticing and familiar looking. She would tell you you looked good in a pair of shoes and you wouldn’t take them off for a week. She would comment on how interesting your choice in hairstyle was that day and you’d start wearing it down instead, not knowing if she meant it as a compliment or an insult, but not willing to take the risk of looking stupid in front of her.

Angela tried to look away from those Mona Lisa eyes, but the grip they had on her was too strong. More than that, she simply didn’t _want_ to look away. There was something in that woman's gaze that Angela missed dearly, and very few things could distract her from the moment she was sharing with her.

“Enjoying the view?”

Angela let out a shriek and shook her free hand in the air, turning towards the sound and swinging her oil lamp as she did so.

“Scheisse!”

The only exception being, of course, the woman in the painting herself.

***

Big blue terrified eyes found her in the dark. The first ones she recognized since a very, very long time ago.

It’d been more than a year since the Countess of Annecy had turned, or so she assumed; she hadn’t cared much for keeping track of time, especially during the first few weeks before she gained control over her thirst. Memories violently shook her head in the midst of her conversion, and her recollection of those days was foggy and confusing.

Something Amelie did remember, more clearly than she would like, was the helpless body of her husband beneath hers. Eyes wide open and limbs aggressively shaking. Blood pouring out of his neck like an open faucet. Her lips pressed tight against it trying to catch every single drop, no matter how hard she tried to fight the urge to drink.

Those were the last familiar eyes she’d seen.

And now, just as she did whenever she needed her, she saw Angela’s.

She wasn’t a stranger to the doctor’s cold gaze in the slightest.

“You scared me…”

“What are you doing here?”

Amelie didn’t mean her words to come off as harsh as they did, but the way Angela swallowed and looked away for a moment made her cringe at herself.

That wasn't the way she'd imagined their reunion would go down.

“I’m not really sure, to be honest with you.” The blonde smiled for a quick second before her expression went back to its hesitant appearance. Her eyes squinted, she leaned forward to try and get a better glimpse at Amelie, who stayed unmoving in her comfortable spot in the dark a set of stairs higher up. “I um... bought this place.”

“You did _what_?”

Word had reached Amelie’s ears, in the form of visitors screaming for their lives and trying to explain their presence for a chance at mercy as she fed off of them, that after her husband’s death and her own disappearance the Château had been declared abandoned due to the lack of any possible heir and would soon be demolished. Leaving her without a home.

She didn’t exactly have a plan regarding where she would go once such a thing happened; for now she kept busy feeding the idea that a monster lived in the castle and everyone that visited met a terrible fate, hoping it would be enough to, at least, delay its unavoidable fall.

“With what money?” Amelie insisted.

“I worked and I put aside some of my earnings and… I did it.”

Amelie blinked a couple times, honestly speechless.

Angela opened her mouth to say something more, but Amelie’s stoic stare invited her to close it and look away once again. 

It was clear the Countess would not be breaking the silence anytime soon, too busy thinking about what an idiot the woman had been to buy a decaying building in the middle of nowhere without having the means to maintain it, so Angela had to come up with something to keep her interested before she decided to vanish. A game of cat and mouse she knew the blonde was very familiar with.

“I- We all thought you were dead.”

Amelie cackled, the sound very far from expressing anything joyous the way laughter tends to do.

“Dear, I _am_ dead.”

Even from that distance, she could see the goosebumps forming along the bare skin of Angela’s arms.

***

There it was.

What she’d hoped and feared most had been confirmed by the very woman she’d come looking for.

Angela wasn’t a stranger to the speculation going on in the town of a monster residing in the Château Guillard after its owners’ passing. Everyone claimed to know a friend of a friend that had attempted to visit and never came back.

She was a woman of science, not one to believe children’s tales about beasts and creatures lurking in the dark.

But Amelie’s disappearance, or rather her own inability to get over it, had changed something in her.

If believing in the unlikely existence of blood sucking monsters that fed off of humans meant there was a chance that Amelie wasn’t dead and Angela could see her again someday, then she was more than happy to throw years worth of study out the window and ignore her better judgement.

She wasn’t sure if it was a good thing or a bad think that she’d been right in her insane assumptions.

“I don’t understand.” The blonde muttered, drawing her eyebrows together and fidgeting with the skirt of her dress in a futile attempt to calm herself.

“I think you do.” Amelie replied, shifting her posture and showing movement for the very first time since Angela had lied her gaze upon her dark silhouette. “I think that’s why you’re here.”

The doctor tried to swallow the knot that had formed on her throat, hurting herself in the attempt and leaving it feeling sore and weak.

Truth was, as always, Amelie was right.

She had no use for the Château. Hell, she didn’t know what she was going to do with it when she inevitably ran out of money to keep it standing; her salary wasn’t precisely something to call home about, even less when she tended to work for free when her patients had no means to pay her. She wasn’t one to let people die if there was something, _anything_ she could do about it.

So, why did Angela make such a senseless investment?

There was definitely a word for it, but it wasn’t one that Angela was ready to accept.

Let’s just say, Countess Lacroix had been her most frequent patient during her first year in Annecy, and her closest friend during the next four ones preceding her mysterious disappearance.

As Amelie stepped out of the darkness and into the dim light of the staircase below her, Angela was reminded of the reason she’d decided to move there.

Her portrait managed to capture as much of Amelie’s essence as it could, at least that’s what she thought judging from her own memory. But being faced by her actual physical presence... there was so much the painting missed.

The way the edges of her lips slightly curved up, the tired but focused expression in her eyes, the enticing movement of her fingers along the railing…

But something was different.

Amelie had always been a rather pale woman, a clear sign of how little need she had to work under the sun and, accordingly, the kind of money she owned.  
But this was different. Her skin hadn’t just turned a terrifying shade of white, but she looked just... sick. The color had been completely drained from her face, shades of grey enhancing the deep indentation beneath her cheekbones and intensifying her eye bags.

During the many years they’d shared, Angela had _never_ seen the woman in such a concerning state.

“Lost your tongue?”

Angela blinked a couple times, never tearing her eyes away from Amelie’s approaching form.

“I’m- No.”

Amelie smiled, a sight that made Angela’s eyes fill with tears.

She ran to meet her, interrupting her graceful descent down the stairs. She almost fell down on her knees, saving herself by wrapping her arms around Amelie’s waist and pressing the side of her head against her chest, still standing a step underneath her.

“Angela, you…”

“I thought you were gone forever.”

The blonde closed her eyes tight and parted her lips, breathing through her mouth in a weak attempt to keep her stuffy nose from revealing just how close she was to crying. Amelie’s chest rose and fell as she took a deep breath. Her skin felt freezing cold when her hands grabbed at Angela's arms and pulled her away, forcing her to look up into her eyes.

“I don’t think you know how dangerous this is for you, Angela.”

“I do.” She quickly interjected, firm and serious. She wrapped her hands around Amelie’s forearms, imitating her gesture, only now realizing how torn and destroyed the Countess' clothes were. “I know exactly what you are.”

“Really?” Amelie asked, raising one of her eyebrows, interested. Angela loved to see that look on her face. How much she’d missed the anxiety inducing duality of her gaze. “What am I, then?”

The blonde stuck the tip of her tongue out for a moment to wet her lips, studying the way Amelie’s stare fell down to her mouth before she forced them back up to meet her eyes once more. She knew the feeling was mutual.

“A vampire.”

Amelie didn’t reply for what felt like forever. Eventually, she asked a new question.

“Are you scared?”

“No.” Angela didn’t hesitate; fear was all she’d experienced when she thought she would never see Amelie again. Now, what she felt was very different from that.

One of Amelie’s hands moved away from the doctor’s arm and up to her face, where she wrapped a piece of her hair around her finger under her attentive gaze before letting it go and pressing her palm against Angela’s cheek. She leaned in towards the touch, something she’d craved for days on end for more than a year.

The thought she was about to get killed did cross Angela’s mind, and somehow not even that was enough to get her to leave Amelie’s side.

She saw a glimpse of hesitation in the Countess’ eyes, something that revealed enough of a peek of humanity in her that Angela would love to delve deeper into.

“Would you run if I kissed you, doctor?”

The question told Angela she hadn’t been the only lonely one of the duo, and in a twisted way the knowledge made her happy.

She smiled up at Amelie. Her unfazed expression couldn’t fool her. They could stay there for as long as they needed, and Angela could try and find a cure for her condition.

Let the people of Annecy speculate why the crazy doctor had decided to move out into the ruinous Château and spend the rest of her days isolated from the rest of the world. She had everything she needed inside its four walls.

“No.”

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you @AcousticMalta, as always, for organizing this year's Mercymaker Day <3


End file.
